Articles
Section
> Questions and Answers:
1:
Mirza Ghulam Ahmad claimed to be the Promised
Messiah. Does that not mean that he claimed to be a
prophet?; 2:
Mirza Ghulam Ahmad claimed to be a recipient of
Divine revelation. Is this not another way of
claiming prophethood?;
3:
Can you name the mujaddids of the first thirteen
centuries?; 4:
Some Muslims consider you as kafirs
[non-Muslims] and excluded from the pale of
Islam. What do you say to that?

Questions
and Answers:1:
Mirza Ghulam Ahmad claimed to be the Promised Messiah. Does
that not mean that he claimed to be a prophet?;
2:
Mirza Ghulam Ahmad claimed to be a recipient of Divine
revelation. Is this not another way of claiming
prophethood?; 3:
Can you name the mujaddids of the first thirteen centuries?;
4:
Some Muslims consider you as kafirs [non-Muslims]
and excluded from the pale of Islam. What do you say to
that?

Question
1:Mirza Ghulam Ahmad claimed
to be the Promised Messiah. Does that not mean that he
claimed to be a prophet?

Answer:
Definitely not! Ahmadis believe that the Promised Messiah
was to be a mujaddid of the Muslim nation, appointed
to the task of defeating false Church doctrines and
propagating Islam among the Christian nations. Hazrat Mirza
has frequently elaborated this point. For instance, he
writes in Taudih Maraam:

"If it be objected that the
like of the Messiah must also be a prophet because the
Messiah was a prophet, the reply to this is that our lord
and master (the Holy Prophet Muhammad) has not laid it
down that the coming Messiah shall be a prophet; nay, he
has made it clear that he shall be a Muslim and bound by
the Law of Islam like ordinary Muslims" (pp.
9-10).

In A'inah Kamaalaat Islam he
states:

"It must be remembered that
the claim of being the Promised Messiah is not in any way
greater than the claim of being a recipient of Divine
communication or a mujaddid from God... To give
the name 'Promised Messiah' to the mujaddid of
this age seems to be based on the expediency that his
great task is to over-throw the supremacy of Christianity
and counter their attacks, and to shatter with strong
arguments their philosophy ... and to establish fully the
evidence of Islam against them" (p. 340).

Question
2:Mirza Ghulam Ahmad claimed
to be a recipient of Divine revelation. Is this not another
way of claiming prophethood?

Answer:
According to the clearest teachings of Islam, Divine
revelation as granted to non-prophets will continue
forever as a blessing for the righteous among Muslims. The
Holy Quran says:

"For them (i.e. the auliya or
friends of God) is good news in this world's life and in the
Hereafter" (10: 64). The good news here (mubashsharaat)
has been described by the Holy Prophet Muhammad as the
only thing that remains of prophethood after him. The Holy
Prophet has also said: "There will be among them (i.e.,
Muslims) men to whom God will speak though they would not be
prophets" (The Sahih of Bukhari). The Holy Prophet has
termed such a person as a muhaddath (one spoken to by
God although not a prophet).

The Promised Messiah has clearly
denied the allegation against him that he claimed to be a
prophet while affirming that God spoke to him as He has
promised to speak to non-prophets. For instance, "I am not a
prophet but a muhaddath from God and a recipient of
Divine communication so that I may renovate Islam."
(A'inahKamaalaat Islam, p. 338); and, "There
is no claim of prophethood but of being a muhaddath which
has been advanced by God's command" (Izaalah Auham,
p. 421); and so on.

Question
3:Can you name the mujaddids
of the first thirteen centuries?

Answer:
Even if we could not name them, this would not disprove
their coming. The Holy Quran states that prophets appeared
among all the nations of the earth, and so the fact the name
of only a few of them are known cannot be used to argue that
prophets have only appeared among one or two nations.
Similarly, the Holy Prophet's hadith proves the
coming of mujaddids in all centuries even though it
may not be possible to name them all.

However, many Muslim religious figures
in history have claimed to be the mujaddids of
their eras; IN ADDITION, Muslim religious scholars of the
past have described some of their predecessors as
mujaddids of their times. In fact, Shaikh Ahmad of
Sirhind, India, is quite commonly known in the Indian
subcontinent simply as Hazrat Mujaddid Alf Thani
(mujaddid of the second thousand - he appeared at the
head of the eleventh century hijrah).

From historical sources the following
list of mujaddids may be compiled :

And, of course, the mujaddid of
the fourteenth century of the Hijrah[Muslim
Era] is Hazrat Mirza
Ghulam Ahmad of Qadian, India (1835-1908), besides whom no
other Muslim has claimed to be a Mujaddid of this
century.

Question
4:Some Muslims consider you
as kafirs [non-Muslims]
and excluded from the pale of Islam. What do you say to
that?

Answer:
Let us quote the Founder of the Ahmadiyya Movement on this
point:

"We believe in the five
pillars of Islam ... We believe that there is no god
besides God, and that Muhammad is His Messenger and the
last of the prophets. We believe that whoever adds to, or
detracts from, the Islamic Shari'ah even one whit,
is excluded from Islam. And we instruct our community
that they believe in laa ilaaha ill-Allah Muhammadur
rasul Allah; and they consider as their duties
salaat [prayer],
saum [fasting],
zakaat [charity],
hajj [pilgrimage],
and other obligations imposed by God and His Prophet, and
act according to Islam. It is incumbent to believe in all
those things which, according to the ijmaa'[unanimity]
of the Ahl-Sunnah (i.e., the orthodox), constitute
Islam" (Ayyam Sulh).

Thus, by the grace of Allah, not only
are we Muslims, but we are also the only group dedicated
purely to the propagation of Islam.

Muslim leaders, both religious and
political, have publicly recognised and applauded our
efforts to propagate Islam. Among such leaders are the late
Quaid-i-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah (founder of
Pakistan), the late Liaqat Ali Khan (first premier of
Pakistan), and the famous Maulana Muhammad Ali Jauhar, to
name but a few.

As for those Muslim ulama who dub us
kafirs, it is a fact that they call each other
kafir as well. The
Muneer Inquiry Commission Report (Pakistan, 1954)
concluded that almost every Muslim sect or group in Pakistan
was considered a kafir by someone or other of the
ulama! Thus these verdicts of
kufr against us have no value or credibility or
basis.

It may be noted that the
Quaid-i-Azam was strongly opposed to any such
verdicts against those who declared themselves to be
Muslims, and he adhered to the Lahore Ahmadiyya view that
all those who recite the Kalimah Tayyibah are
Muslims:

"He said that it was totally
wrong to place restrictions against Ahmadis joining the
All India Muslim League. He farther advised the Kashmir
Muslim Conference not to create sectarian conflicts, and
to gather all those who recite the Kalimah under
one flag" (Reported in Inqalaab, 3 June
1944).

Note also that in the days when the
Lahore Ahmadiyya Movement managed the Woking Mosque and
Mission, many famous Muslim leaders prayed there behind the
Ahmadi Imams of the mosque. Among such leaders were Tunku
Abdur Rahman of Malaysia, the late King Faisal of Saudi
Arabia, and the late President Ayub Khan of
Pakistan.

It should be added, to close the reply
to this quest on, that even some of the Takfir-happy
'ulama, who issue verdicts of heresy in all directions, do
not consider us as kafirs. The famous Pakistani
politico-religious leader, Sayyid Abu Ala Maudoodi, who died
in September this year, once wrote in a letter:

"I do not consider the
Qadianis (i.e., Rabwah Movement -Ed.) and the
Ahmadis (the Lahore Ahmadiyya Movement -Ed.) to be
in the same category. The Ahmadi group is included in the
Muslim community. We cannot issue a religious verdict
(of Kufr -Ed.) against them since they deny the
prophethood of Mirza (i.e., the Founder of the
Ahmadiyya Movement)" (Letter ref. no. 182, dated 23
Muharram 1357 (about 1938/1939) from Darusalam,
Pathankot, Punjab India).

Articles
Section
> Questions and Answers:
1:
Mirza Ghulam Ahmad claimed to be the Promised Messiah. Does
that not mean that he claimed to be a prophet?;
2:
Mirza Ghulam Ahmad claimed to be a recipient of Divine
revelation. Is this not another way of claiming
prophethood?; 3:
Can you name the mujaddids of the first thirteen centuries?;
4:
Some Muslims consider you as kafirs [non-Muslims]
and excluded from the pale of Islam. What do you say to
that?